Disco de Creedence Clearwater Revival: “Cosmo's Factory”

Amazon.com reviewers have no idea what they're talking about. Yes, this album has many popular singles on it, but that's not all. Every single song on this album is amazing and this is by far Creedence Clearwater Revival's best album. I was never really excited by any CCR album as I was excited with this one.

It combines every good quality of CCR on to one wonderful album. It has the extended/jam tracks that are essential to any southern rock album, in my opinion. "Ramble Tamble" is a 7-minute rocker that just makes want to get up and start playing air guitar. While most people dispose of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" as excessive or filler, I find it to be one of the best songs on the album. CCR adapted the song as well as any other artist could have. Surprisingly, John Fogerty puts about a pretty damn good 7 minute guitar solo, proving that he is one of the most underrated guitar players of the seventies.

Also included on this album are the fifties covers/sounding tunes that Fogerty loves so much. "My Baby Left Me" and "Ooby Dooby" are both fifties covers, but are still both awesome. In fact I've come to like the 50's type songs CCR does as well as any of their other stuff because of the ones they do on this album. Truly great.

Of course, there are the wonderfully written and catchy pop-like southern rock (for lack of a better style name) songs that Fogerty and CCR are most famous for. For example "Travelin' Band" which is perhaps my favorite CCR song ever, "Who'll Stop the Rain" which is as catchy as any XTC song, though totally different, "Up Around the Bend" which is catchy in a way only John Fogerty can achieve, "Lookin' Out My Back Door" a tale of a Southern home in a Southern city which is of course another gem, and "Long As I Can See the Light", a good way to end this amazing album on a high, but slow, note.

I cannot stress enough how good this album is. It is up there with such amazing southern rock albums as "Allman Brothers Live At the FIllmore East" and "Pronounced Leh-nerd Skeh-nerd", and may be even more impressive than those two. No matter who you are, you have to have this album!!!!!! Though amazon.com was incorrect in simply calling it a singles album, they were completely justified in rating it an ESSENTIAL ALBUM. Buy it NOW

This album is a rarity if only for the sheer amount of hit songs it spawned. Creedence was the ultimate singles group of its day, and this record (released in 1970) really exemplifies that fact, showcasing their good-ole' jugband swamp rock. Let's face it; many of their other albums were quite patchy (some even lacklustre at worst), but this one is consistently excellent, featuring many of their most fun and catchy tunes. 'Cosmo' rolls on like Proud Mary, integrating many hit-and-run favourites like "Up Around The Bend", "Travellin' Band", "Lookin' Out My Back Door" and "Ooby Dooby" (their silliest track) with folky stuff such as "Who'll Stop The Rain" and a brooding Vietnam War song "Run Through The Jungle". This album features their version of Marvin Gaye's "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" in all of its 11 minute+ glory (no shortcuts here) plus an energetic opener jam named "Ramble Tamble" and a soulful closer "Long As I Can See The Light", making for one of the finest pop albums of 1970. If you want Creedence at their very best, go for this one - it's as good as any greatest hits compilation.

"Cosmo's Factory" is often considered Creedence's best record.

Some (including me) would say that "Green River" and "Willy And The Poor Boys" are more consistent records, but there is no doubt that this album features some of the group's best songs.

The opening track, the long, meandering instrumental "Ramble Tamble", is not one of them, though, and CCR's takes on "Ooby Dooby" and "My Baby Left Me" are pretty good, but nothing special, and they pale by comparison to John Fogerty's originals.

Fogerty wrote some of his best songs for "Cosmo's Factory", which produced no fewer than six hit singles, every one of them peaking in the top five. "Up Around The Bend" and "Travelin' Band" are glorious, piledriving rockers; "Who'll Stop The Rain" is one of Fogerty's true classics, a wonderful folk-rock song with thoughful lyrics and a great melody, and the #2 hit "Long As I Can See The Light" is a glorious slow soul tune and one of the most underrated songs in Creedence's catalogue.

The group's rendition of the Marvin Gaye classic "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" is excellent as well, sporting a great riff, and Fogerty does a great Bo Diddley on "Before You Accuse Me".

All in all, there are a couple of lesser songs here, but most of "Cosmo's" is simply magnificent, capturing the spirit and versatility of Creedence Clearwater Revival in general, and John Fogerty in particular. One or two forgettable songs have snuck onto the disc, sure, but almost all of what is here is excellent, and "Cosmo's Factory" is a must-have for any self-respecting Creedence fan.

Apart from their flawed first & last albums, Creedence actually never made anything short of perfect, short of classic, or short of 'greatest', so I can't say if this record is better than 'Willy And The Poor Boys', for example... actually my main point must be, that any serious fan of music in general should have all their classic albums, while anybody who really LIKES creedence should ALSO acquire their inconsistent but mostly marvellous debut, & their chaotic last album (which nonetheless includes such classics as 'Sweet Hitch-Hiker' and 'Someday Never Comes')

'Cosmo's Factory' opens with 'Ramble Tamble', a joyous & exhilerating rocker, a true anthem for a world that never was (or was it? !). It changes midway into a slower, almost Abbey Road-era Beatlesque song. The next song is a cover of the classic 'Before You Accuse Me', &, not to offend anybody else who has covered it, but this definently THE version of that song.

The following song, 'Travelin' Band' is one of their greatest ever, a simply wonderful slice of a rockabilly-like stomper, recalling figures such as Gene Vincent & the King himself.

The next song, the cover 'Ooby Dooby', is sort of a comedown from the skies, but it still works, though it is eclipsed by the next classic, 'Lookin' Out My Back Door', a lazy, gleamin' jewel of a rock song with a divine intro, followed by another classic, the paranoid, screeching rock of Creedence's great anti-Vietnam song, 'Run Through The Jungle'.

The third, & arguably greatest, classic in a row follows; 'Up Around The Bend' is driven by a marvellous riff & is the purest Creedence, simply breathtaking, lifegiving...

In this way, the cover of 'My Baby Left Me' could be seen as a disappointment, but few songs could have held the atmosphere of 'Up Around The Bend', and succesfully followed it ('Bad Moon Arising' actually works wonders on the 'Platinum' best-of, where it sounds so perfect just after 'Up Around The Bend' that I was surprised they didn't come off the same album...). Anyway 'My Baby Left Me' is a great song, but it's not 'Bad Moon Rising'... not that that matters, for the last three tracks are almost-classics all the way, from the brilliant 'Who'll Stop The Rain' through 'I Heard It Through The Grapevine', again the best version of that classic song, to the pure Creedence 'Long As I Can See The Light', that shimmers till the end of the album.

With Concord Music Group having purchased the Fantasy catalog, the fortieth anniversary of Creedence Clearwater Revival's debut LP provides a suitable opportunity for a fresh round of reissues. All six of the original foursome's albums (from 1968's Creedence Clearwater Revival through 1970's Pendulum) have been struck from new digital masters and augmented by previously unreleased tracks. Those who purchased the 2001 box set can pick up most of the bonus tracks separately as digital downloads (the two longest bonuses are CD-only). Those who didn't buy the box, and think they'll buy all six reissues may want to consider the box set for its inclusion of pre-Creedence work from the Blue Velvets and Golliwogs, the seventh CCR album Mardi Gras, the 1970-71 live recordings and several box-only bonuses. But for those just wanting to pick up a few favorite albums, these reissues are the ticket. Each is presented in a digipack with original front and back cover album art and a 16-page booklet with photos, credits and new liner notes.

Creedence's fifth studio album, Cosmo's Factory, expands upon the gains of their previous two releases even as it returns to the jamming, psychedelic roots and enthusiastic cover songs of the band's 1968 debut. The result sums up the band's evolution with socially-charged guitar jams ("Ramble Tamble"), concise, iconic hit singles ("Travelin' Band," "Up Around the Bend" and "Lookin' Out My Back Door"), memorable B-sides ("Who'll Stop the Rain," "Run Through the Jungle" and "Long As I Can See the Light"), heartfelt throwbacks ("Before You Accuse Me," "Ooby Dooby" and "My Baby Left Me"), and a tour de force eleven minute reworking of Marvin Gaye's "I Heard It Through the Grapevine." Rhythm guitarist Tom Fogerty would stick around for the next LP (Pendulum), but this one's actually the more fitting summation of the original foursome's 2-1/2 year run. John Fogerty might well have sensed this was the high point as he sings "Lookin' Out My Back Door" weary but satisfied, and "Long As I Can See the Light" as an elegy.

Given that all three B-sides should have marked their own time on the charts, one can easily imagine this album spinning off six hits, with the lengthy album tracks tucked away on the late night radio waves of underground FM. Legacy's 2008 CD reissue adds three bonus tracks, including a post-LP studio take of "Travelin' Band" recorded without horns, a previously unreleased live version of "Up Around the Bend" from the group's final European tour and a 1970 studio jam of "Born on the Bayou" featuring Booker T. on organ. If you're only going to buy one Creedence LP, this is as good as it gets. Of course, that could equally well be said about Green River or Willy and the Poor Boys, and perhaps even Bayou Country. Best bet: get them all. [©2008 hyperbolium dot com]